PRESIDENT BUSH: We'll have opening statements, and then we'll accept two
questions a side. Mr. Prime Minister, welcome. We value our friendship
and our partnership with the people of the Czech Republic. I remember well
my visit to your beautiful country.

We've had a significant discussion today. It turns out the year eight is
an important number in Czech history. And we're determined to make the
year 2008 a strong chapter in our relationship. We view the Czech Republic
as a strategic partner. We've discussed a variety of issues. I want to
talk about two issues.

First, visa waiver. I've always felt our visa laws needed to change. I
didn't like the idea that we treated our friends in the Czech Republic
differently than other friends in Europe. There's new law in place, which
requires leadership from the countries such as the Czech Republic. Mr.
Prime Minister, you and your government are providing that leadership.

We signed an important memorandum of understanding. We were able to do so
because your negotiators were very smart. They represented your people
very well. We still have more work to do, but I'm confident we can get it
done. And I hope the people of the Czech Republic understand that your
government and your country is ahead of the line of anybody else when it
comes to a visa waiver program. And I congratulate you on your leadership.

Missile defense. It's in our interest to put defenses in place to deal
with the true threats of the 21st century. Russia is not a threat to
peace. Regimes that adhere to extremist ideologies, which may have the
capability of launching weapons to those of us who love freedom, they're
the threats to peace. And a missile defense system is aimed to deal with
those threats.

And of course we want it in the context not only of a bilateral
relationship, but in the context of NATO. We're both strong partners of
NATO. NATO has got to be in a position to deal with the true threats of
the 21st century. And so we had a good discussion on this important issue.

In our discussions, I strongly respect the sovereignty of the government of
the Czech Republic. Where they have concerns, of course we'll listen. And
so I want to thank you for that. And at the same time, of course, we
discussed very important research and development opportunities, defense
cooperation activities.

And finally, I thanked the Prime Minister for the courage and sacrifice of
the troops that are in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Prime Minister said that
there will be a reduction in troops in Iraq, and I fully understand that.
After all, we're reducing our troops based upon success. And I thank your
willingness to send troops into Afghanistan. It makes sense to help young
democracies thrive. They will look back at these decisions, Mr. Prime
Minister, and say, thank goodness for the peace that prevailed as a result
of the hard decisions we made today.

And I welcome -- you're welcome, thank you for coming.

PRIME MINISTER TOPOLÁNEK: (As translated.) Well, I think that President
Bush already mentioned everything I wanted to mention originally. However,
let me revisit or come back to the issue of number eight and its importance
in our history. Number eight played a very important, nay, a key role in
the history of the Czech nation. In 1918, when the first Czechoslovak
republic was founded, it was founded with help and assistance from the
American President Woodrow Wilson.

Unfortunately 1938, which was the time of the Munich Agreement, the
Americans were not with us. And therefore it was an unfortunate year,
similarly as 1948, we commemorated 60 years since the coup d'etat of the
communists in 1948 just on the 25th of February.

In 1968 the Prague Spring has occurred, and unfortunately after a few
months of relative liberty and freedom, we were occupied by the Soviet
armies.

So what I want to say is, in terms of these number eight years, it was
always very important for the Czech Republic, nay, even decisive, whether
we were with the Americans or whether we were on our own. And I really
wish that the year 2008 will become a similarly important year, both for
the Czech Republic and also with the United States of America and our
mutual relationship.

And I believe that stationing the missile defense system in our country is,
in terms of its importance, similarly important to those events I've been
just mentioning in relation to the number eight in our history.

And everybody is, of course, interested to find out whether an agreement
has been already done. There are only three words remaining to be resolved
and discussed. (Laughter.) But sometimes one word matters a lot and
sometimes an agreement might fail just because of one word. But this is
not the case. These are just minor details and I'm sure that we're going
to finalize it very soon.

And in terms of the visa waiver program, I would like to use this
opportunity and thank President Bush for his efforts. And I very much
appreciate when a politician or a person says something or promises
something and he also delivers on this promise, and this is the case.

So I would like to thank President Bush for his leadership, but I also
would like this leadership to become his ownership. (Laughter.) And of
course there are many politicians in the world, but there are very few
politicians who are real statesmen. To have one's principles, to stick to
those principles irrespective of -- to go against all odds and adhere to
those principles, this is what only very few people can do. We've not
spoken about this extensively, but this is what I appreciate the most.

What I believe is of also equally significant importance is the starting of
the strategic dialogue between the two countries, between the U.S. and the
Czech Republic. And I think the outcome of these negotiations is also very
good. Both countries we agreed on research and development in the area of
missile defense and generally in the defense systems.

Just one marginal note on the visa waiver program process. I think that
the negotiations have been really tough and the result achieved is a true
breakthrough -- a breakthrough moment. I think that this is a great
achievement, because first we joined the Schengen zone, which enabled the
Czech citizens to travel from Lisbon, as far as Vilnius without the use of
any passport or ID, and we did the same for our citizens in terms of
traveling to Canada and the United States of America. So we guaranteed one
of the basic human rights, which is freedom of movement.

We at the same time are fully aware of the risks and dangers of a security
nature which exists all over the world, and therefore we want to guarantee
higher security to our nation. And also the agreement takes into
consideration the reciprocal principle -- the principle of reciprocity.

I also would like to mention that a great deal of our discussion revolved
around issues of human rights in the world. We spoke about Cuba, we spoke
about the recent events and our hope for the future. And we also talked
about other countries which so far have not been so fortunate to live in
freedom like the Czech Republic.

I, personally, am very happy from this meeting. I want to thank President
Bush for his openness and for this wonderful meeting.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Thank you very much. A couple of questions, Jennifer.

Q Thank you. Can you elaborate a little on what's holding up an
agreement on missile defense? And how close are you to getting an
agreement with Poland, as well?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, I appreciate that. Obviously, this is a complicated
issue that requires the United States, one, to make the case of why a
missile defense is needed in the first place; that it is aimed to bring
stability to Europe; that it's important for mutual security; that it fits
into the concept of NATO; and will honor the sovereignty of the Czech
Republic or Poland.

And so the discussions revolve around a status of forces type agreement,
which requires understanding by the Czech government of exactly what is
meant when it talks about stationing a radar site. We will be coming to
their country -- under what conditions, how will people conduct themselves
-- and these are all very legitimate questions that the Prime Minister is
asking. The same questions are being asked in Poland.

And I explained to the Prime Minister the following thing: people are
wondering, is this aimed at Russia? Is this an anti-Russian system? And
the answer is, of course not. The system we're developing will be able to
deal with one, two or three types of incoming missiles. And Russia could
overwhelm a system like this. This is a system to deal with threats that
will be evolving in the 21st century.

And so the Prime Minister made it very clear when it comes to the Russian
issue that his government will be making the decisions about any so-called
presence. Do we want the Russians to be able to -- you know, allay their
fears by understanding what's going on? Of course we do. But he made it
clear to me that the Czech Republic will be making the decisions about who
gets to come into their country. And I fully understand that.

And so, you know, there's a lot of discussions going on. These aren't easy
agreements to put in place. But we feel optimistic that we will get this
done. As the Prime Minister said, we're down to a couple of words. What
you probably want to know is the three words. I'm not going to tell you.
(Laughter.) I am not going to tell you -- that's five words, I tell you,
I'm not going to do the three. (Laughter.)

Q How close are you to --

PRESIDENT BUSH: Close. Three words is close. We started off with a blank
page, and now we're down to three words. But, anyway -- look, there is a
will to get this done, for the sake of mutual security and for the sake of
peace.

PRIME MINISTER TOPOLÁNEK: Just to be more specific regarding these three
words --

PRIME MINISTER TOPOLÁNEK: It actually relates to environmental protection
and the standards that should be adopted. So we're actually looking for
the standards which would be the strictest possible standards to be applied
in terms of ensuring and guaranteeing environmental protection. But that's
just a technical matter which is going to be resolved very soon. It's not
any problem.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Why don't you call on somebody from your press corps, if
you care to.

Q Mr. President, would it be acceptable for the United States to have
radar in the Czech Republic without interceptors in Poland, should that --

PRESIDENT BUSH: I don't see how -- you've got to have interceptors in
order to make the system work. The idea is to use a radar system to detect
a launch headed toward NATO countries and then shoot the thing down. And
in order to make the system work, there has to be an integrated system.

And of course what we will work to do is, one, make the system effective,
integrated, comprehensive. And the interesting opportunity is for Russia
to realize the benefits of such a system by extending the radar coverage
into their country, because they will be under the same threat of
radicalism that we will be; "we" collectively.

If some of these countries develop a weapon that's capable of developing a
nuclear warhead, free nations, nations such as Russia, do not want to be in
a position of political blackmail. And our job as leaders is to deal with
the issues of the day, but also deal with the issues of tomorrow in a way
that yields a peaceful world. And that's what we're doing.

Stretch.

Q Mr. President, thank you. I have a national security question, two
parts. You just talked about the importance of stability in Europe. How
does it serve our national security to support the redrawing of borders in
Europe vis-á-vis Kosovo? And secondly, can you say how -- has our national
security actually been degraded by the lapse of FISA?

PRESIDENT BUSH: First, let me talk about Kosovo. We discussed Kosovo. As
a consequence of the war that took place during the leaders -- during the
tenure of Mr. Milosevic, one of the effects has been the desire for the --
those of us in the United Nations to promote what's called the Ahtisaari
plan, which is a supervised, independent Kosovo.

This is a difficult issue, and I understand it's a difficult issue. But
the U.S. government supports the supervised independence. We believe in
free societies and we believe it will eventually lead to peace, but there's
no -- no border has been withdrawn [sic] in that sense, Stretch. It's a --
Kosovo is a -- Kosovo's borders have been clearly defined. The type of
government has changed. Now as part of the Ahtisaari plan, we fully expect
this independent Kosovo to honor minority rights within their borders. And
so our position has been clear.

Secondly, you asked about whether or not the United States of America
should be able to listen to terrorists' phone calls coming into the United
States. And the answer is, absolutely we should be doing this. There is
still an extremist threat. People still want to attack our country, and we
better understand what they're thinking, what they're planning and who
they're talking to.

And yet unfortunately a law passed to give our professionals the tools has
expired. And it's expired because people want to take class action
lawsuits against private phone carriers and other companies that have --
were believed to have helped us protect America. It's not fair to say to a
company that was believed to have helped us, it's important for you to help
us, and then you get sued for billions of dollars. And such a policy would
make it very difficult to get companies to fully cooperate with us in the
future.

The law is expired, but my fellow citizens must understand the threat to
America has not expired. And our citizens who are paying attention to this
debate must understand, without law America will be more vulnerable to
attack. Democrats and Republicans supported this law, and the House
leaders must bring it to the floor, where it will pass with both Republican
and Democrat vote. And if this law is allowed to expire, America will be
more vulnerable. And that's inexcusable and it's indefensible.

Q (Asked in Czech.)

PRIME MINISTER TOPOLÁNEK: Well, actually, I think the same as you think.
Well, if he traveled together with Mr. Zaoralek, then I think it is
unforgivable.

First of all, I would like to say that these activities of the opposition
leaders and their foreign policy does not really serve the interest of our
country. And I would like to remind you that when I was in the opposition,
and we were in the opposition we never created any kind of foreign policy
on our own. And therefore, I understand the reasons for this visit to
Syria. I would be much happier if they traveled as tourists, and nothing
else.

I would like to actually mention that I got this present from the Secretary
of Commerce, Mr. Gutierrez. It is a bracelet and there is a simple word on
it, which is "cambio" meaning "change." And in Cuba you can actually get
arrested for wearing this bracelet. But when I come back home I will wear
this just for the sake of Mr. Paroubek and Mr. Zaoralek. (Laughter.)